Friday, February 19, 2010

No Jihad Here, Folks. Best Move Along, Now

University of Ottawa law prof/"human rights" activist Amir Attaran tells readers of the National Post (where he appears to have been given a regular gig--whassup with that?) that "terrorism" is no biggie. And since he manages to avoid any reference to "jihad is the way; sharia is goal," the animating statement behind Islamic terrorism, he is able to make the case that treating "terrorists" as common criminals and not as warriors for Allah is the best approach:

...Some may find it surprising that the by-the-book approach of the police has so thoroughly outperformed the more aggressive approach of the spies and diplomats. But there is no reason for surprise. Canada's criminal justice rules are the fruit of hundreds of years of evolution and refinement in the common law. To be sure the rules are not perfect, but they are time-tested, and therefore reliable anti-terrorism tools. How arrogant and ignorant of CSIS and DFAIT to imagine that they could do better by ignoring that accumulated wisdom, and how shameful that Canada's courts were sometimes gulled into letting them do so.

The spooks' and diplomats' failure -- not partial failure, but truly cataclysmic, total failure -- to instigate even a single terrorist's conviction is resounding. They remain amateurs still, and one searches in vain for evidence that failure has taught them how better to discern real from imagined threats. Just look at CSIS's self-parodying court battle to censor the national archives' files on, of all people, Tommy Douglas.

It is time to dispel the enchanting and dangerous myth that terrorism is special. Better results are achieved by recognizing that terrorists are just criminals, to be prosecuted under criminal law rules.